Undone
by Cascade Waters
Summary: I'm waiting to let my world come undone. Companion to End of the World. WARNING: Contains non-sexual spanking. Don't like, don't read.


Let My World Come Undone

By firechild

Rated PG-13

Spoilers: 3-1-06 'With Tired Eyes, Tired Minds, Tired Souls, We Slept'

Warnings: spanking (rather harsh), angst to the nines; possible mistakes in canon

Active ingredients: Lucas, Keith, Karen, Whitey's generous contribution

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters, except for Whitey's 'friend'….

A/N: Obviously you have in front of you an AU now. This is a prequel to "End of the World;" 'Let my world come undone' is part of a line from "Waiting For the World to Fall" by Jars of Clay--I highly recommend getting the song or at least reading the lyrics, as it's an incredible song and inspiration much….

--

_Phthunk._

_Phthunk._

_Phthunk._

The sound of the small rubber basketball hitting the wall, staccato and arrhythmic, provided a hollow counterpoint to Lucas's grumbling as he chunked it over and over again, trying and failing to find any satisfaction. He couldn't believe that he was stuck in here, in the house, in his bedroom, grounded like a little boy for no reason, when he had just over a week to finish getting ready for what he had planned. He wasn't even allowed to use the land line to call and let Mouth know he was going to be late tonight, and his mother had confiscated his cell. She'd taken his phone, his electronics, his books, his paper and pens--she'd left him with nothing, in fact, but the four walls, two doors, one bed, the baseball-sized ball she didn't know he had, and his own thoughts.

He hadn't eaten much of anything substantial for days, but still he couldn't sit for long for all the nervous energy that came from his dear friends, Mountain Dew and Red Bull. Even as he paced and groused and used the wall as a backboard, he could feel the tremors that reminded him that he was running on guilt and borrowed steam--it was only a matter of time before he'd have to find a way to recharge or he'd collapse, and he couldn't let that happen. He couldn't give in to the exhaustion, just like he couldn't give in to--

No. No. He wouldn't go there. He flat refused. He wouldn't think about it. He wouldn't. He wouldn't let the nagging, gnawing ache take hold of any more of him than it already had. He'd already spent the past three weeks paying homage to his guilt and regret; he would not bow down to anything else, would not let pain take the power away from him again, would not let anything take away that power, even if that power was his pain.

Three weeks.

Three weeks since the shooting. Three weeks since his world, and the worlds of every teenager in this town, had been blown apart. Three weeks since four years of ignorance and insensitivity had been compressed into a handful of hard, cold plastic and steel. Three weeks since his own selfish choices had nearly ripped most of the people who mattered to him from this earth.

Three weeks since he had begun to run from sleep so that he would not have to look into the eyes of the dream he knew would come, the dream who always came when he couldn't run anymore.

Three weeks since he and Mouth had begun to work, begun to drive away their pain by using their guilt and shame as a shield, by pumping sugar and caffeine and sometimes harder stimulants into their bodies so that they could pretend to function. Three weeks since they had begun to take the bits and pieces of the life they'd neglected, the life that had ended that day somewhere between homeroom and hell, and use them to build a marker, a pyre, a symbol of what had happened there in that town, to that soul, to that boy, and to everyone around. They built a pyre that would never burn away, and the fire that rose from that pyre would remind them that more than one life had ended that day.

She knew. She had to know. She had to know what they were working on, why they were working on it; she had to know that they needed to do it, needed to finish it, not for themselves but for everyone else. For him. For Jimmy, the sweet, smart, sardonic kid who hadn't deserved to live out his last moments in pain in that hallway, hadn't deserved to die every day for almost four years while those who were supposed to stand for him simply stood oblivious.

So why? Why had she done this, now? Why had she confined him to his room, grounding him like a child, taking away everything he could have used to pass the time, to distract himself, to plan, to keep his thoughts from veering toward… that thing he wouldn't face? Why?

That was why.

He'd suspected, since she'd turned her back to him as she climbed into the ambulance the day of the shooting, that she was angry with him. Angry because he didn't stop this, angry because he didn't keep it from starting, angry because he didn't come through for her, angry because he wasn't the one bleeding into her hands on the way to the emergency room. No, wait. It was more than that; it had to be. She wasn't just angry.

She was ashamed.

His mother was ashamed of him, ashamed of his choices, his attitude, his failure.

She wanted him to think, wanted him to face the demons, wanted him to have nothing left but the roaring in his own head, telling him over and over again how he'd failed, how he was worthless, how he should have died, how he should just get it over with. She wanted him to hurt, to ache, to bleed. She wanted to punish him, and she was doing it without touching him. She wanted to keep him from paying his penance, to keep him forever in debt; she wanted him to leave this undone. She wanted him to leave.

No, he couldn't do it. He couldn't go down that path. Not yet. He had to do this first, he had to finish this. For Jimmy. For Peyton. For Keith.

As he bounced the ball off the wall and caught it over and over again, Lucas began to eye the outside door with a more critical eye. Normally he was too well-behaved to sneak out, especially when he was grounded, but this time….

He was distracted from his thoughts when the ball didn't come back to his hand. Pivoting, confused, he turned toward the other side of the room and came face to face with something he'd never thought he'd see again.

"Pretty sure there's a rule about playing with this thing in the house, buddy."

He thought he must have fallen asleep because the dream had come to him again, but he caught the woodsy smell of aftershave, and he'd never had a sense of smell in his dreams.

Sling dangling empty across his chest, Keith stood in the interior doorway of his nephew's bedroom, leaning against the door frame with his left shoulder--and gripping the ball in his right hand. He looked whole, relatively healthy if a little thinner than he had been and a little bulky in the right shoulder from the bandage, and very, very real. For some reason he also looked a little sad, and Lucas couldn't help the twinge that came with thinking that maybe his uncle was sad to have to see him.

Another twinge of guilt came when Keith smiled a little and said, "Long time, no see." Lucas hadn't gone to visit Keith at all, hadn't even let his mother give him updates; he made no effort to ignore the guilt and shame he was feeling, but not thinking about possibly attending his uncle's funeral had made it easier to compartmentalize the feelings. If he spent his mental energy telling himself that all his conflicting emotions and regrets made sense, he was spared having to think about anything else, and maybe in time he'd come to believe it himself.

So, bearing the weight of eternity on his shoulders and facing what looked like the end of his world on the threshold of his bedroom, Lucas stood, mouth open, unable to speak until his uncle asked the simplest, most common question.

"How ya doin'?"

Lucas's single word, "Peachy," said with enough hard sarcasm to anchor an ocean liner, told Keith all he needed to know. The older man sighed, gently lobbed the ball back to his nephew, and said he'd see him in a little while, shutting the door as he turned away.

--

"How is he?"

Karen turned and looked up, concern rolling off of her in waves to lap at Keith as he entered the kitchen. She followed the tide, stepping into his arms and reveling in his solid presence.

He wanted so badly to protect her, but he understood better than most that when it concerned her son, being sheltered and protected was the last thing she needed or wanted, and he had to respect that this woman whom he cherished was a woman of incredible strength and resolve; she knew, he knew, the entire town knew that she had done herself what she had to do to raise a young man of commendable character, and though he had been with her almost every step of the way, Keith understood that more than the actual help, Karen just needed to know that she didn't have to do it all alone.

He also understood that she had passed this trait on to her son, who often had a much harder time accepting help, and therein lay the problem.

"I asked him how he was doing. I think if he packed any more sarcasm into one word, we'd have the beginnings of a kid-size black hole."

"So it's worse than I thought." He could feel Karen wilt a little against his chest.

Keith sighed. "Hate to say it, but it's just about how I expected. He's had too much time to stew, to try to reason himself behind a wall; we need to move now, while he's still off-guard and hasn't had time to realize that he's about to be handled."

Karen stiffened just a little. "We have to handle him." It wasn't a question, but he sensed the underlying apprehension.

"Yeah, babe, we do. He's not handling himself. He needs us to be the adults. I'm sorry, I hate this just as much as you do." She felt the sincerity in his soft words, his tightening arms.

"I know. How will--" She trailed off, not wanting to think about what was to come, not wanting to think about the fact that she knew in her heart that Keith was right, that this had to happen and that this was the only way; she loathed this, but she would rather be there for her son as he went through this than watch him slowly destroy himself or--not much better--start to think that he could risk his life, whatever the reason or results, without consequences to himself and to those who loved him.

"I'm hoping that once we get started, he'll just come to it on his own, choose to let go. He's gotta know he's safe with me, so maybe it won't be as much of a fight as I'm afraid it'll be." Keith tried to sound encouraging, but Karen knew his misgivings, shared them. He was an amazing creature, this boy she'd--they'd--raised, but not all of his layers and dimensions were light and easy.

She drew in a deep breath and the scent of the man she loved, knowing that in order to save their boy, they had to act, and act now; she also understood that, drifting just outside his core of steel, Keith was worried that Lucas's trust in him wasn't as deep as he'd thought, wasn't deep enough. The only way for both of her men to realize that they would come through this alive and intact was for them to come through it. So, with one more deep breath, Karen straightened and looked her fiancé in the eye. She started to say something, but before any sound could emerge, he took her hands. "I'll be careful with him, I promise."

Karen nodded, a smile ghosting across her face. "I know--I was going to say, 'Love him,' but you already do." Seeing his grateful nod, she raised up to kiss him and then to hug him for strength. Just a moment later, he pulled loose, cracked his neck, stretched his right arm, and headed toward the master bedroom.

--

"Hey again."

Lucas looked up, startled. He remembered Keith saying he'd be back in a little while, but the teenager didn't remember his uncle's definition of "a little while" being all of seven minutes. He wasn't sure what to do, so he stood up from his seat on the corner of the bed, worrying the ball in his hands.

"H-hey."

Keith gave him a gentle smile as he stepped into the room, reaching around behind him to close the door.

"Have a seat, kid. We need to talk."

--

Karen sat alone at the kitchen table, crying into her hand. The house had fallen quiet just moments ago, but she knew it would not stay that way for long.

She'd been able to hear nearly every shouted word between Keith and Lucas, as Keith had plowed through her son's defensiveness, determined that Lucas would understand that they all loved Peyton and unquestionably any of them would die for her, but that this wasn't about Peyton--this was about the necessary repercussions from Lucas's decision to risk his life. Eventually Lucas had had no arguments left and had fallen quiet, for the moment.

Mere seconds later, she heard a faint _thwack_, followed by an even fainter protest. Steady as he was in almost everything, Keith was going to work on Lucas's bottom with a paddle he'd borrowed from Whitey (who'd been only too happy to dig out his trusty old tool when Keith had nervously asked for the services of his own old nemesis to impress upon Lucas that he wanted to think very carefully before taking such a chance again.) She knew that Keith planned to take it far enough to be sure that Lucas let go of the infection of his guilt, and no farther. Unable to watch but unable to leave her child in pain, she sat there, trapped, listening for endless minutes as her fiancé nursed a fire meant to thaw a part of her son's heart that had gone cold to himself.

--

It hadn't worked.

The last of the tears he'd allowed to fall clung to his chin, and he tried to ignore the itch their warmth brought. He'd totally gotten the message about putting himself at risk--his uncle had well and truly helped him change his thinking about that. He knew that his parents loved him; he knew that no matter how grateful they were for what he'd done for Peyton, they would not accept a danger to him. He got that. He appreciated it. He hated to admit that he'd needed that, had needed to know that, especially now. He understood that his mother wasn't ashamed of him, hadn't been punishing him. He got all that. And he got that he wouldn't have been able to deal with the silence between himself and his mother for much longer if Keith hadn't done just this, no matter how hard it had been on both of them.

They'd tried--_Keith_ had tried--but Lucas had won.

They still hadn't gotten to him, gotten past the scar tissue. They couldn't; he wouldn't let them. He'd worked too hard to build that scar, to keep it up and make it thicker, to make sure that nothing could heal the wound, that nothing could make him forget the part he'd played in this tragedy. So even though it felt like this would never be over, even though he lay here, trapped and helpless and hurting, even though stopping the tide seemed like the hardest thing he'd ever had to do, he held on. The world was shaken, maybe tilted a little off its axis, but it still turned, still burned.

Oh, how it burned.

--

Keith sighed and closed his eyes. It wasn't working.

Oh, he knew that Lucas had gotten the point about taking care with his own safety--Keith had felt Lucas's submission to that and had stopped paddling to get the boy to admit that he knew his family loved him and would fight for him and that there would be consequences for Lucas's choices.

Keith had been hoping that submission to his punishment would trigger a deeper reaction, and that his nephew would just release his guilt and pain and let his uncle help him remember how to breathe again. He had been hoping for that, but had expected something much more like this--his easygoing nephew could be extraordinarily stubborn when he felt trapped, and Keith meant to keep him trapped until Lucas gave up. Ignoring the burning ache in his wounded shoulder and the tearing in his heart, the man looked down at the boy he loved more than life and prayed that they would both be able to handle this.

--

The swat took him by surprise, less by the coming of it or by the sheer pain of the sting over already-burning flesh than by the fact that it wasn't the smooth wood of the paddle, but the warm toughness of his uncle's hand. Four more landed rapidly in separate spots, not giving him time to process them, before Keith spoke, his voice oddly tender and rough as he urged Lucas to let go. When he got no response from the boy, Keith brought his hand down again, repeating his command to let go. Slow, now, and spaced out to allow time to speak, the swats came hot and hard and scattered, only the tone of the man's voice giving away his reluctance to continue this.

Keith was pushing, pressing, going through with the last thing in the world he wanted to be doing because it was the only way in the world that he knew to get through to this boy with a choke-hold on his own downfall. A piece of the man died with every strangled cry and whimper that came from his nephew, but he was prepared to push as far as he had to; this wasn't a battle he could afford to lose.

Lucas was holding his own for the moment, though it was taking more of his will than he'd ever exerted before. With every command and entreaty to let go, the boy shook his head, each movement becoming more frantic and less controlled as he struggled to keep a grip on himself. He was losing ground, and he knew it. It wasn't so much the pain itself, although that definitely figured in; it was the combination of the pain, the heat, the embarrassment, the discomfort, the battle of wills, his need to hold on versus his uncle's determination to have him submit, losing the fight to keep quiet, and the growing urge to obey Keith just so that this could all be over.

"Come on, kid, don't make me spend all night doing this. You can end this now, you can make it stop--all you have to do is let go." Beneath the plea and the honest pain that Keith was letting Lucas hear in his voice, so obvious that there could be no doubt that the vulnerability was not a sign of weakness, ran a cord of steel. The rhythm of the swats hadn't changed, nor had the force. "Come on, Lucas--let go!"

They were both surprised when the teenager responded, his panic and distress plain in the wheezing, choking words. "I-ah c-c-ahh-caaann't!" He couldn't stop a strangled sob that spilled from him like a ribbon of pain.

"Why? Why can't you let go? Why do you want to hold on so tight? Why are you so afraid to let go? You know you need to." Lucas shook his head dizzily, feeling like he was teetering on the edge even as he knew that his uncle would never let him fall without being there to catch him. Amazingly, among the agony and the struggle and the tension of the situation, Lucas managed a clear moment of thought--why was he so afraid, really? What would happen if he released, if he just stepped off of that edge?

That was an easy one--

It would be the end of the world.

But what would be so bad about that? Wasn't he more than half wishing for the end, anyway? Could he do it? Was he really ready to let go, to let his world come undone?

He didn't get the chance to answer that, because with the next searing swat that blazed across his skin, he felt a small quake, a tremor under and around him--his uncle's breath hitching, from pain and frustration and grief. And suddenly, it hit Lucas, impacting deeper than the swat it rode in on, that while he was holding so desperately to his own horror and guilt and the scars on his soul, Keith was holding desperately to him, unwilling to give him up. His uncle, who had stood between him and a gun and had nearly died for it, was here, now, standing between him and a different kind of danger; even death couldn't keep Keith from standing for him.

And just like that, Lucas fell. He lost his footing, lost his grip, and fell over the edge, breathless with the terror that came with a total, pain-filled loss of control. Instinct told him to flail, to fight, but he didn't even try; he just didn't have any strength left in him, or any will to fight or do anything more to cause this man pain. He would never be sure whether he chose this or was forced to it, but it didn't really matter. It was easier to let go, to stop caring, to let it all wash over and through him, than to keep waiting and wondering what was going to happen next; it was easier just to fall, to hold on to nothing, than to move or to think or to breathe. He went limp, almost insensate, driving himself beyond sobbing.

There was nothing left in him. There was nothing left of him.

It was over.

--


End file.
